Lightning Strikes in Orlando for Tampa Bay, Beat Blues’ 4-3

The Tampa Bay Lightning started off the first of three games against western conference teams with a 4-3 win against the St. Louis Blues at the Amway Center in Orlando, Florida.

The starter’s in net were Cederick Desjardins, who was hoping to impress for the Lightning, and All-Star Brian Elliot for the Blues. Elliot showed why he was one of the top goalie’s in the league by not allowing any goals until halfway through the third when Lightning hopeful, Adam Erne, finally got one past the goalie bringing the score to 3-1 Blues.

By this time the Lightning had already made the switch between the pipes opting to go with Kristers Gudlevskis who did not let any pucks through after the change. Adam Erne and Tom Pyatt helped to even the score giving the crowd of 6,162 an overtime show.

After the extra period the game was still tied, thus causing a shootout show that saw Valtteri Filppula getting his first of the preseason and Adam Erne getting his third of the game. It will be interesting to see how the rest of the preseason goes for this eighteen-year-old 2013 draft pick. If he impresses in future games like he did tonight it would not be surprising to see him move to the big leagues this season. Adam Erne and fellow 2013 pick Jonathan Drouin are going to be two names to watch in the future of the sport.

Goals Scored:

1st Period:

12:52 Dmitri Jaškin (Blues)

1:52 Dmitri Jaškin (Blues)

2nd Period

Jaden Schwartz (Blues)

Adam Erne (Lightning) PP Goal

3rd Period

Adam Erne (Lightning)

Tom Pyatt (Lightning)

OT

SO

Round 1 Purcell- miss  Rattie- miss

Round 2 Filppula-score  Stewart- miss

Round 3 Erne-score

Tonight they will go up against the Nashville Predators at the Tampa Bay Times Forum at 7:30 p.m and Friday the team will travel to St. Louis to play the Blues with face-off coming at 8:00 p.m.